The cape is merely
a low hill with steep sides, standing lonely by the beach.

The _Valkyria_ kept at some distance from the coast, taking a
westerly course amidst great shoals of whales and sharks. Soon we
came in sight of an enormous perforated rock, through which the sea
dashed furiously. The Westman islets seemed to rise out of the ocean
like a group of rocks in a liquid plain. From that time the schooner
took a wide berth and swept at a great distance round Cape
Rejkianess, which forms the western point of Iceland.

The rough sea prevented my uncle from coming on deck to admire these
shattered and surf-beaten coasts.

Forty-eight hours after, coming out of a storm which forced the
schooner to scud under bare poles, we sighted east of us the beacon
on Cape Skagen, where dangerous rocks extend far away seaward. An
Icelandic pilot came on board, and in three hours the _Valkyria_
dropped her anchor before Rejkiavik, in Faxa Bay.

The Professor at last emerged from his cabin, rather pale and
wretched-looking, but still full of enthusiasm, and with ardent
satisfaction shining in his eyes.

The population of the town, wonderfully interested in the arrival of
a vessel from which every one expected something, formed in groups
upon the quay.

My uncle left in haste his floating prison, or rather hospital. But
before quitting the deck of the schooner he dragged me forward, and
pointing with outstretched finger north of the bay at a distant
mountain terminating in a double peak, a pair of cones covered with
perpetual snow, he cried:

"Snæfell! Snæfell!"

Then recommending me, by an impressive gesture, to keep silence, he
went into the boat which awaited him. I followed, and presently we
were treading the soil of Iceland.

The first man we saw was a good-looking fellow enough, in a general's
uniform. Yet he was not a general but a magistrate, the Governor of
the island, M. le Baron Trampe himself. The Professor was soon aware
of the presence he was in. He delivered him his letters from
Copenhagen, and then followed a short conversation in the Danish
language, the purport of which I was quite ignorant of, and for a
very good reason. But the result of this first conversation was, that
Baron Trampe placed himself entirely at the service of Professor
Liedenbrock.

My uncle was just as courteously received by the mayor, M. Finsen,
whose appearance was as military, and disposition and office as
pacific, as the Governor's.

As for the bishop's suffragan, M. Picturssen, he was at that moment
engaged on an episcopal visitation in the north. For the time we must
be resigned to wait for the honour of being presented to him. But M.
Fridrikssen, professor of natural sciences at the school of
Rejkiavik, was a delightful man, and his friendship became very
precious to me. This modest philosopher spoke only Danish and Latin.
He came to proffer me his good offices in the language of Horace, and
I felt that we were made to understand each other. In fact he was the
only person in Iceland with whom I could converse at all.

This good-natured gentleman made over to us two of the three rooms
which his house contained, and we were soon installed in it with all
our luggage, the abundance of which rather astonished the good people
of Rejkiavik.

"Well, Axel," said my uncle, "we are getting on, and now the worst is
over."

"The worst!" I said, astonished.

"To be sure, now we have nothing to do but go down."

"Oh, if that is all, you are quite right; but after all, when we have
gone down, we shall have to get up again, I suppose?"

"Oh I don't trouble myself about that. Come, there's no time to lose;
I am going to the library. Perhaps there is some manuscript of
Saknussemm's there, and I should be glad to consult it."

"Well, while you are there I will go into the town. Won't you?"

"Oh, that is very uninteresting to me. It is not what is upon this
island, but what is underneath, that interests me."